Madison Sinclair Is Dead
by ScoobyGal55
Summary: This Neptune resident wants to clear the name of a wrongly convicted man while finding out who killed her best friend. Maybe she'll fall for the wrong guy and maybe she'll be a complete outcast, but she'll definetly be quirky 100 percent.
1. Sheriff Lamb is One Handsome Devil

Madison Sinclair is Dead

A/N: Bear with me. This story revolves more around the people we don't get to see very often. The story may sound familiar (heh).

Last year my best friend was murdered. The man on death row for her crime could not have done it. Don't ask me how I know- not yet, at least. I should let go. Or at least that's what my school counselor told me. Impossible, I told her. Sometimes I do wonder, though, why I continue to search for the truth when the truth has brought me nothing but hurt so far, but then I remember that my best friend would be starting college today, and then I continue to search. Bring on the pain.

An entire summer of searching for answers has brought me very little information. Hey, don't look at me that way. I'm new to this whole detective biz. The week before she died, she had broken up with her boyfriend for, like, the millionth time. Sure he may be a complete jerk idiot but he would never hurt her. I know that. Plus his alibi was air tight. Out of the country, two witnesses.

Her only sibling was busy at a soccer game with more than half the town watching. Not that this certain soccer star would ever even hurt a fly. Her parents, well, they were in a hotel room on the other side of town. Other than that, I have no clues, nowhere to start.

Who would possibly want to murder my best friend? She may not have been the nicest person to outsiders, but not horrible enough that somebody would want to hit her with something heavy.

Madison Sinclair was the best friend I ever had, and now she's gone. Now I can't trust anybody. Not my old group of friends, not my ex-boyfriend and not even my own family. I am alone in my search. I can only trust myself. I will-

"Shelly Pomroy? What are you doing here?" a snarky voice from behind asks. "Again."

Sheriff Lamb hasn't really been a fan of mine lately. My visits to the Sheriff's department have been more and more frequent. He gives me a mocking smile. I smile back, but not at him. I smile about the past, as I remember that there used to be a time when he was a family friend.

"What do you want this time? Here to tell me some new conspiracy theories?"

"That, and get a good look at you. And may I say, you are getting handsomer and handsomer." Good work Shelly. Good looks and quick wit, you are quite the well-rounded person.

"I don't have time for this." He begins to walk away.

"Neither does Marcus." That gets his attention, even if it is only to turn around and say something snotty. He faces me and gets close. Too close.

"Marcus Wheeler killed Madison Sinclair," he tells me, matter-of-factly.

"Oh, I remember the days when I was just as naïve as you. The days I believed that if somebody was found guilty in a court of law that the person was guilty. But then one day I woke up with the urge to buy a clue." I smile and Lamb shakes his head, which gives me a strange feeling of satisfaction.

"The murder weapon, a giant rock used to bludgeoned your friend to death, came from Wheeler's backyard."

"Anybody could have-"

"Which has an electrical fence around it. Fibers from his favorite ugly sweater were found in crevice of the rock."

"As you said, it was from his backyard."

"He has no alibi, nor would he suggest an alibi. And, oh yeah, her body was found in the back alley behind Wheeler Industries."

"Madison's father had business at Wheeler Industries, she could have been there for a million different reasons. Secondly, Marcus Wheeler has an alibi, he's just too afraid to say it."

"And I suppose you know what it is."

Of course I don't. It could be anything for all I know. Maybe he saw somebody kill Madison and is afraid for his life and the life of his family. Maybe he is protecting somebody. But I don't know. And Lamb knows it. I was at a party and Marcus wasn't. In my heart I know that Marcus Wheeler, my first boyfriend and the only man I'll ever love, is not a murderer.


	2. The Sweet Old Lady and Other Monsters

Madison Sinclair Is Dead

Chapter 2

A/N: Yeah I wrote this chapter a couple of times but I was really waiting to see if Meg would die or not.

The first day of school has never been so hard.

No, nobody is harassing me. I'm not looking over my shoulder for a friend. Instead I'm frantically looking for a class that starts in two minutes taught by a teacher who is notoriously wicked in a hall that does not exist. I've asked two people already where I could find Building 4D, classroom F.

"Miss Tandy?" the sorority girl asked. "Have fun with that."

The second boy… laughed.

Be an English Major, Shelly. You're really good at English, Shelly. Hearst has a great English program, Shelly. It's really the best campus around, Shelly.

I hate high school counselors. All they want is for students to get out of their hair. Unless, of course, they are counseling you on grief management by telling you to just "get over it"

Now I'm in High School Part Two. Everybody from Neptune High seems to go here. Everybody I had to pretend to be friends with last year. Everybody who secretly spoke behind my back, talking of how it was my fault my best friend died.

Hearst College: the best place to find frienemies.

Ahh! Building 4D. I always knew you existed, deep down inside. And with 54 seconds to go.

The classroom is small, packed wall to wall with two-seater desks. The only seat left is front row center, right in front of the desk of the sweet little old lady who is to be my teacher every Monday and Thursday from 10 am to 1 pm.

My eyes jet around the room. Eager faces with scared eyes look in my direction willing me to sit before the Beast Teacher they've all heard about bites my head off. In the back, a boy is already sleeping in his pathetic FratBoy Hawaiian Booze Cruiser shirt. I hate him already.

I sit down and look at the sweet lady- slash- Beast Teacher. Some annoying rumor spreading gossip girl must have told everybody that this lady was a monster after getting a less than satisfactory grade on her paper about "Jessica and the Cutest, Hottest Boy Who, Like, Totally Liked Her."

"Morning students," the sweet old lady says with her sweet old lady voice. "Welcome to Writing the Short Story. This class will not be as easy as it may have seemed in the course catalog."

Somebody audibly moans in the back of the class. I'll bet my tuition money that it was FratBoy.

Sweet, adorable, old lady ignores him completely. "I want to shape all of your young minds into sharp, clever writer. I want all of you children to be a success in life, and will expect nothing less. For the next six months, all of you will be amateurs and failures, but when you leave this classroom with a passing grade, you will have accomplished more than you could have ever imagined. So open up your minds and welcome to the beautiful world of college."

The people around me begin the clap. I join in. I force myself not to look behind to see if FratBoy has continued his BitchFest or if he has caved into peer pressure.

"I am Miss Tandy," sweet, adorable, genius old lady says. "Not Mrs.

"Not Ms.

"Miss."

Okay, so she's particular about her name. This means nothing. Less than nothing.

"And I will be your worst nightmare."

Huh? What happened to wanting us to be successful in life? Where did Sweet Old Lady go?

"I can already tell that most of you are unintelligent and lazy. This will change or you will drop my class. And nobody drops my class without my permission. Nobody."

Oh I get it. Demons exist and Sweet Old Lady has been possessed by Evil Cranky Witch.

"Now copy down the notes from the board. These will be your assignments for the next six months. I can and will add to them at my leisure. When you finish copying the notes, you may leave. I will not answer questions. I will not tolerate brown nosing. I will not be your friend. The due dates of the projects are on the board. There will be no late assignments from anybody. No excuses. I will assign your peer correction buddies. You may not and cannot change them. No excuses. Now get to work."

So this is what hell is like. Hmmm.

As I finish, so does the rest of the class. MISS "Devil" Tandy sit in her desk and knits a scarf for Rosemary's Baby while everybody tries to leave as quietly as possible, myself included.

"TOGA!" yells the soon to be dead FratBoy. I will kill him. I will rip out his throat. I will feed his remains to my dog.

I turn around. "Why do you have to be such a…. Dick?"

"Shelly?"

Kill me.


	3. Newsflash

Madison Sinclair is Dead

Chapter 3

A/N: Enjoy! By the way, I'm not going to invent too much of the relationships between the already known characters. I know that Dick and Madison dated. Shelly and Meg were good friends (reference: A Trip To The Dentist). I think there are two Shelly's on the show, a white blond girl from the pilot and the Shelly Pomroy from A Trip To The Dentist (the "hot foreign exchange student"). Shelly #2 is our Shelly. I think the white Shelly dated Duncan ("She's a talker." Duncan. "I hate it when they talk." Logan.) but for plot reasons Shelly Pomroy dated Duncan. Again, enjoy!

The Story So Far: Madison Sinclair, the Neptune resident everybody loved to hate is dead. Marcus Wheeler, Pan High's richest student, is blamed. Shelly Pomroy, Madison's best friend and Wheeler's ex-girlfriend, doesn't- and can't- believe the story. She may not be a private eye, but she sure knows how to annoy the local deputies, making weekly visits to the Sheriff's department. Being an annoying rich girl throwing boring parties at the Kane estate is the only life she has ever known. But now, she's close to getting to the bottom of things. Or she would be if it weren't for one little annoyance….

"No way."

"I know what your thinking," Dick Casablancas, my worst enemy, says. "Why did such a fine looking, intelligent boy like myself decide to go to Neptune's very own college instead of branching out in the world in places like England, France, or, uh, Utah?"

I hate him.

"No, I know why you chose to come here. Not only does Hearst have a great Greek System and lots of parties, but you can also drive home once and a while to get Beaver to do your homework."

He frowns. I hate him.

"What I can't believe is that you got into any other place besides Neptune Community College."

"What can I say, my application blew them away."

"So Beav wrote your essays?"

"Correctamundo." God, I hate him. He smirks. I hate that smirk.

Find an escape route, Shelly. Don't let him talk to you any more. Your brain may fry. That's a very bad thing. He's a very bad thing.

"Well…. I should go. I'm supposed to meet my roommate." I say. I head out of Building 4D but he follows.

"Ah, roommate? That sucks. I have an awesome apartment a couple blocks away, if you want to check it out."

No Dick. I don't want to check it out. I hate you. Don't you get it?

Okay, maybe it sounds like I'm a hateful person, but Dick is a dick. He and Madison went out for a while, but he was as faithful as could be expected. She never showed it, but she really loved him. He loved women. Actually, I wouldn't say 'loved'. Maybe 'like liked'. The only person Dick could ever really love is himself.

And maybe Cassidy. But nobody calls him Cassidy. 'Beaver,' Charming, right?

When I, Madison and Dick hung out, Cassidy would follow along. I could never call what we did with him 'hanging out'. He was more like Dick's shadow.

Now I know I'm being mean. Cassidy is okay. I even, uh, went out with him for, like, a week, so it doesn't really count.

When Madison and Dick were in public it may have seemed to many that they hated each other, but when the whole school wasn't around to watch them they were… intense. Too intense. After a while, I couldn't be around the two of them together anymore. I spent my time without Madison with Meg Manning.

When they broke up, Dick spread rumors about Madison. I pretended for Madison's benefit to be unaware of the rumors, but believe me when I say they were nasty. But as far as I know, Madison had no idea. She masked her pain by trying to go after another boy. Duncan Kane was her new obsession, an obsession that eventually got her kicked off the cheerleading squad. When he and I… well there is no need to get into that now.

"I don't think that'd be such a good idea, Dick." I say, and then make my merry way out.

I check the time. It's only eleven o'clock. I guess that's what happens when you're kicked out of class two hours early. Which reminds me: THREE HOUR CLASSES? WHAT GIVES?

Now that I've gotten that out of my system….

I left a note for my roommate Cindy, a girl I have yet to meet even after living in the dorms for almost 18 hours, asking if she'd meet me for coffee, and she left reply: simply "Sure."

Two hours and thirty minutes gives me just enough time to annoy the Neptune Deputies.

My car purrs as I turn the key in the ignition. My radio turns on, serenading me with the best bands a college radio can afford.

"That was Wanker with 'Julie Ripped Out My Heart and Replaced It With A Can of Peas' Wanker will be in the studio with us tomorrow on Crazy Mark's morning show."

I'm sure Wanker is an amazing band, but I change the channel anyway. I search for an oldies station, something to soothe me.

"She stole my heart and then-"

"It just isn't American! If Bush wants to-"

"Rock on!"

"Sinclair-"

"Because I only have eyes for you…"

I quickly turn back to the station before. "The loss of the last appeal could mean bad things for Wheeler. I repeat what I have been saying for the past month, this kid should have gotten the chair."

"But Harper," squeaks another voice. "There is no motive."

"Which makes him even more psychotic. He claims innocence but he won't give an alibi. He refuses to tell police where he was, not even when the rest of his life is on the line."

"All the evidence is circumstantial. If we've learned anything from the Lily Kane murder case it's-"

"You keep bringing up the Lily Kane murder case, but I don't see the relevance. In the Kane case the evidence pointed to Koontz, and he confessed. The system wasn't at fault."

"But it was flawed. The confession was the end of the case. No further investigating was done. Aaron Echolls was brought in on the same crime and prosecution didn't even attempt the death penalty."

"There were completely different circumstances. If Koontz's story were true, it was premeditated murder. Echolls committed a crime of passion."

"Better police should have been brought in to investigate. Bottom line, Harper, is that I have no faith in the Neptune County Sheriff's department."

Finally, something the news and I can agree on.


End file.
